A handout released by the Rodong Sinmun, newspaper of North Korea’s ruling party, on Nov. 17, 2013, shows North Korean leader Kim Jong-un inspecting a food factory.

The study by the Food and Agriculture Organization and World Food Program, which took place in the fall and covered all of North Korea’s provinces, found that food output was up about 5% from a year earlier. But the agencies estimated that 84% of households still have “borderline or poor food consumption.”

“Despite continued improvement in agricultural production, the food system in the DPRK remains highly vulnerable to shocks, and serious shortages exist, particularly in the production of protein-rich foods,” said Kisan Gunjal, FAO economist and co-leader of the mission.

North Korea’s food problems are the result of years of mismanagement of the economy, outdated farming practices, a lack of access to fertilizers because of sanctions and extreme weather conditions such as flooding during the summer rainy season, which causes widespread erosion.

The agencies noted the increasing importance of markets and informal bartering to secure food following the breakdown of the nation’s public food-distribution system after famine years of the mid-1990s.

Concerns also exist about North Korea’s manipulation of surveys of food conditions, its controls over aid distribution and the potential retrieval of distributed aid.

Recent reports suggest that while many in the country have food problems, trade in high-value food products is increasing among the more affluent sectors of society. Daily NK, a Seoul-based website specializing in news about North Korea, reported this week that North Korea is exporting more seafood to China to earn foreign currency.

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